This week we were informed that as a Baylor Heath Care System employee, you must submit a personal health screening including: BMI, fasting glucose, BP and cholesterol signed by your physician, as part of a "wellness program."
Ok, fine whatever. BUT if you don't, you will be charged $25 per paycheck!
In addition, Baylor will no long be hiring tobacco users. In addition to your drug screening, you will be screened for nicotine and denied the position if tested positive.
This was on the front page of the Metro section in the Dallas Morning News today, and it has a lot of people up in arms.
I worked for a LTC/Hospital/DD home (think it was DD) corporation (probably not known outside of the N. IL/NE. IL/IN area...they were doing this 8 years ago- pumping up how they were doing a good service for all employees. There weren't any insurance premium changes at that time, but companies have to look for ways to make insurance affordable- and if they reward those who are living healthier lifestyles, so be it (I would pay extra for being on lovastatin, insulin, and being overweight- I have tried everything including 22+ years of eating disorders...not in that hades now).
I live in southwest Fort Worth near two Baylor hospitals, have never applied for a job with the Baylor health system, and never will. Their starting pay rates for newly graduated RNs are downright crappy ($22.50 per hour), and their benefits could be much better.
Baylor can get away with this because their primary service area (Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas) is overly saturated with too many nurses competing for too few jobs in the local employment market. Refusing to hire tobacco users is a weed-out tool. BMI screenings, lab values, and other 'wellness' factors are weed-out tools to reduce the size of the stack of applications that recruiters must sort through. In addition, a healthier pool of employees is supposed to result in less costly insurance premiums.
However, I feel that employers are traveling down a slippery slope. Where are they going to stop? Are they going to continue picking through applicants until they hire only the pretty Stepford Wife nurses who are under the age of forty, tall, and thin? If so, the rest of us are dangerously up the creek without a paddle!
As if unemployment rates arent already sky high! Now you can be denied a job because you're A:too fat B:Have inherited high BP or cholesterol or C: partake in (legal) nicotine products on your personal time.Before you know it you will be expected to be physically attractive, have perfect grammer and good teeth!!
Ridiculousness
I wonder what they plan to do with the information in the long run? If you screen for Nicotene you are out, next will it be BMI because that is under your control too as part of a healthy diet and excersize program. Too many twinkies , high Triglycerides, high LDL and low HDL you get canned. I thought discrimination for employment purposes was against the law.
Specializes in Nurse Leader specializing in Labor & Delivery.
But there's a difference between seeing two qualified candidates and choosing the one who is not obese (happens all the time, in fact) and seeing a qualified candidate who is obese and an unqualified or incompetent one who is not obese, and choosing the second one, simply because they're not fat.
Nobody is saying that anyone's going to hire someone based on BMI, rather than skill.
The OP is certainly not suggesting that Baylor is instituting it or will in the future. Are you, OP?
This isn't new and it isn't just happening in hospitals. As others have mentioned, it is happening in all kinds of career choices.
I work for the school district and we had the same kind of policy - but many of the employees didn't like it and had a vote to get a new policy with another company.
So, now I have a higher monthly health insurance cost and I pay more for my prescriptions.
Specializes in Vents, Telemetry, Home Care, Home infusion.
This week we were informed that as a Baylor Heath Care System employee, you must submit a personal health screening including: BMI, fasting glucose, BP and cholesterol signed by your physician, as part of a "wellness program."
Ok, fine whatever. BUT if you don't, you will be charged $25 per paycheck!
This is not a hiring issue but one to get EMPLOYEES to think more about their health and engage in healthier lifestyles. Our health system did the same thing this year but went with reward vs punnisment approach and offered a DISCOUNT of $10.00/pay period to those who participated.
TheMoonisMyLantern, LPN, RN
924 Posts
Several of the posts spoke of the possibility of this in the future, thus my comments.